I like to fly 'missions' with many of my aircraft, since I don't really fly airliners or airline routes. After recently flying the Kirby's King Air to Isla Sorna from Jurassic Park 3, I thought I'd try the movie Capricorn One, about a faked Mars mission. 

 

 

Here we are at Houston Intl (predawn), loading up astronauts and their families for the flight to the Cape, three weeks prior to launch. 

 

 

As we taxi out, Nasa 607, the sun comes up and the rain stops. 

 

 

Crossing the Mississipi Delta,,,

 

 

Turning towards the Cape.

 

 

Parked at the Skid Strip, with astronauts and families disembarked. Capricorn One launches in three weeks. 

 

 

Next, the mission is launched, but Brubaker and crew are secretly loaded onto a Learjet and flow to a secret base in the Nevada desert...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have a Learjet, it's just deciding on the location of the 'base'. Groom Lake looks far too big when you compare it the site in the movie (from my dim recollection). 

The day of the mission to Mars, and the three astronauts are choppered off the pad just prior to launch and Learjetted west to a secure NASA facility:

 

 

 

Final approach for a secret airfield in New Mexico:

 

 

After months of fabricating the Mars mission for NASA, the astronauts realise they won't be allowed to live and steal a Learjet parked on the ramp, That door is notoriously hard to close while on the move!

 

Brubaker fast taxis out, he spots the two black helicopters that appear later i the story, but not the fact that the Learjet is almost dry of fuel:

 

Agents drive out onto the runway to try and block off the escape of the desperate astronauts. Near miss! The undercarriage is ripped away, as one of the astronauts futiley tries to close the door mid-takeoff:

 

 

Within a few minutes the fuel warning lights up, Brubaker circles for a glide landing over the desert and puts the Learjet down gingerly:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stuck in the desert, black helicopters on their trail - the three astronauts are forced to split up in order to find safety....

 

Next part of the mission is to take the part of the Hughes 500 chopper pilots searching for the astronauts. Using Instant Scenery I've placed a learjet in the desert along the line of flight, and three white suited people at points south, east and west of the plane. I used the FSX map utility to place them, so I have no exact idea of where they are...it really will be a hunt for three needles in a haystack. Downloaded a neat Defender for FS9 for the job.

Is OJ going to be in the back seat of a white SUV with a spacesuit glove that does not fit?

Love your mission (and the movie), great plots, each :-)

Cheers

Frank

Its hard work searching for the three astronauts, the Learjet was easy to find, however. 

 

 

 

 

I picked up my first man after an hour of searching ...

 

Love it! Saw Capricorn One at a drive-in theatre a long, long, long time ago. Great theme for an FSX/FS9 adventure!

Remember the movie well.....especially the moment the one astronaut turns up at his own memorial service! Live on TV!

It is a fab movie, I found a copy on You Tube last night and watched it again. It didn't do much for the credibility of NASA, with its obvious inspiration coming straight from Moonhoax rumours :( , but it is one of those 70s conspiracy movies that really caught on and caught the public imagination, especially after Watergate. 

 

Found astronaut #2 this morning, but I'm going to have to leave the last one to chopper number 2. My eyes are going funny staring at all that desert!

 

 

I've learnt a lot about flying choppers, though. Never done it before - and doing something else, like looking for a body in a desert forces you to fly without ever looking at the instruments, and that has helped my learn how to fly it quite quickly I think. I gave up on choppers a year ago ...

 

Next - the red Stearmen flown by Telly Savalas. 'pervert!'

So, finally Eliot Gould has tracked down the signals to the desert and hired Telly Savalas' crop dusting pilot to find the astronauts. 

 

 

They search the desert.

 

 

 

Then spot a couple of mysterious choppers sniffing around an abandoned gas station. 

 

 

They land on the road, the lone remaining astronaut Brubaker is rescued and they fly him off to safety!!